‘This has been a bit of a whirlwind’: Ted Cruz downplays 2016 presidential talk

by Jeff Poor, from The Daily Caller, 07/21/2013 – On Sunday’s “This Week with George Stephanopoulos,” Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz gave a wide-ranging interview to ABC’s Jon Karl about the issues of day, including immigration reform and how he is interacting with colleagues on Capitol Hill.

But presidential politics was the focus of the interview, since it was conducted in the early presidential primary state of Iowa on Friday. Cruz told Karl that presidential politics was not on his mind with the visit.

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“Jon, we are having a national debate about which direction the country should go,” Cruz said. “And what I am doing now is trying to participate in that national debate. I understand that everyone likes to focus on the politics … I’m not focused on the politics. Jon, I’ve been in the Senate all of seven months. The last office I was elected to was student council. So this has been a bit of a whirlwind.”

Karl asked Cruz if the citizenship question would allow the Texas Republican to run for president, since he had been born in Canada.

“My mother was born in Wilmington, Delaware,” Cruz replied. “She’s a U.S. citizen, so I’m a U.S. citizen by birth.”